Defining a Scene

This task gives you a quick methodology to define the parameters involved in the scene creation, i.e. light sources, camera, textures and describe their spatial arrangement in a three-dimensional world.

1. Create an empty environment (either box, cylindrical or spherical).

2. Choose the point of view you want to use then click Create Camera .

3. Click Create Spot Light to define a conical light source then orientate the light as you wish with the help of the light preview on the environment walls. 

4. Right-click the light in the specification tree then select Light View to make sure you have the desired illumination. This command lets you see the light point of view. Only the lit elements contained in the light preview shape will be lit at rendering time.

   Set the lighting attenuation so that it does not end before the environment, otherwise the environment will be almost entirely shadowed.

5. Click Quick Render to make a quick render from the light view. Perform as many modifications as necessary and check that what you get is really what you want to lit.

6. Right-click the Camera item in the specification tree then select Camera View.

   You can then perform changes and make quick renders to adjust the frameset to your needs.

7. Apply a texture on your environment and your part(s) by clicking Apply Material and check the result by creating a quick render.

   Once you are satisfied, you can create a shooting to have a finer result. To do so:

8. Click Create Shooting to define the shooting parameters.

   We advise you not to modify the default shooting parameters except those concerning accuracy. When the accuracy parameters is set beneath the mid value, you obtain a result nearly as identical as the quick render.

9. Right-click a material in the specification tree then select Properties to adjust the material parameters.

10. Click Render Shooting to check the result then go back to the material Properties to correct the parameter definition if necessary.

    Here are a few tips for lighting parameters: Ambient: use very carefully the Ambient parameter ("good" values are around 10%) to avoid final color saturation Diffuse: start by setting the Diffuse parameter to the minimum intensity: when you define the material lighting, the sum of all parameters (except Shininess) should be roughly equal to 1 to render the material with realism, but nothing forbids you to choose higher or lower sum values to achieve special effects: they might simply be harder to control Reflectivity/Specular: set the Reflectivity and the Specular parameters simultaneously Transparency: if the material is transparent, define a Transparency value. We recommend you to define this parameter at the end.

11. When the result is satisfactory, adjust the shooting parameters to refine the result such as the reflection number, the anti-aliasing, etc. in the Shooting Definition dialog box.

12. Click OK when you have finished.

    The scene is defined and ready to be rendered.